If you don’t have the inclination or stamina to read six pretty chunky novels there is an alternative. (I have only read The Eustace Diamonds.)
Simon Raven adapted them for the BBC in 1974 and pulled them together into a cohesive narrative focusing on Plantagenet (Philip Latham) and Glencora Palliser (Susan Hampshire). It has taken me a month to watch the twenty-six episodes and most enjoyable they are. The production is surprisingly dated. The sound fades when a character turns their back; many scenes are composed of a couple sitting side by side on a settle sometimes joined by a third in an armchair; some sets reappear in only slightly different guises and it can seem stilted.
That said, the acting is excellent, as are the costumes and some scenes shot on location. I enjoyed the politics. In the course of the saga there are movements to help the Irish tenantry, for decimalisation, for the disestablishment of the Church of England, trouble over Trade etc. It’s all mostly relevant today. There are cads and opportunists aplenty. Phineas Finn, after a bad start, redeems himself. Burgo Fitzgerald, Felix Lopez, Major Tifto and others do not. The Reform Bill then railways arrive as a backdrop to romance and intrigue. Plantagenet becomes the Duke of Omnium and Gatherum, Prime Minister and Privy Seal. Glencora meddles in politics and is a matchmaker. The mysterious widow, Mrs Max Goesler, from Vienna becomes Mrs Phineas Finn and a member of the Palliser inner circle. It is on one level a classy soap opera but also depicts the changing times. Lady Glencora is forced by convention to marry Plantagenet rather than the most unsuitable man she loves. By the end her children are, reluctantly at first, allowed to follow their hearts by the duke.
Trollope is a skilful mixologist and enjoys writing about the snakes and ladders of politics, money and romance in Victorian England. Fortunes ebb and flow, eddy round the rocks that are Plantagenet and Glencora. Some of the BBC TV cast are well known, all are good actors. An interesting pairing is Lord Silverbridge (the Duke’s eldest son) and his friend, Frank Tregear. They are played by Anthony Andrews and Jeremy Irons, foreshadowing their roles in the 1981 Granada TV adaptation of Brideshead Revisited. Derek Jacobi, Martin Jarvis, Donald Pickering, June Whitfield and Penelope Keith all make appearances to name just a few of a huge cast. Hayley Mills was cast as Glencora but pulled out at the last minute. Fortunately Susan Hampshire fitted into the costumes that were already made. I am a borrower and must now return the boxed set.